Bedona and the giant stared into each other"s eyes or so what she believed. All she saw was the dark shadows under his thick brows. By his face she couldn"t tell what he was thinking. His thick and long beard that hid down to his neck made it impossible to see his expression. He was angry, smiling or leering she didn"t know. His robed body also hardly told her anything except that he was alert and ready. Looking down on him she realized they would be there for a long time and then finally when the dome collapsed under her she would be in a worse position than when she had started.Sitting back she relaxed slightly, and thought on if it would even work. She would look utterly stupid if it didn"t but no one was there to judge. No one but the giant, but she was quickly running out of options.
"I am sorry I hurt you."
Bedona called out. She sounded scared, desperate, she added a slight tremble to her voice and forced her eyes to appear teary.
The man didn"t reply but his pose did relax.
"Y-you scared me and I reacted. I am sorry!" she called out again. The giant still didn"t move. Kneeling back she wrapped her hands around her and shuddered. "Could I-could I get my clothes please?"
This time, like a sudden douse of icy water, the man did move. He slowly stepped back and looked down.
"Yes of course." His voice was mild like a young man"s. If she had only heard it, she would expect a skinny page boy who was too scared to even look up. "I too am sorry I startled you like that. You may go and get dressed but I have some… questions for you afterwards."
He meant it more seriously than he sounded. Which to her sounded like he was making a request at her not like the demand it actually was. "Don"t run, I am not done with you."
What could he want to know from her?
The answer was so many things. If he wanted her because she was an Eye of Aristeros then there wasn"t much she could offer. Her other jobs, she thought about it, weren"t important enough to warrant attention from someone of his caliber, whoever he was. Her last job however, she shuddered…
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Stepping out of her safe s.p.a.ce, she slid down, almost rolled to the base of her dome. She did as much she could to cover herself and jogged toward her things. Kneeling, hiding from the giant man who was standing still, far away from her that he wouldn"t be able to jump her she ignored her clothes and started fishing her bag. How he managed to shock her by suddenly appearing out of thin air Bedona didn"t forget. She felt the cold and smooth surface and brought them out, a pair of recovery potions made by Ava herself. More valuable than anything else she had right now and it was time to finally make use of them. She downed them without making her movement too obvious and started dressing.
Slow and deliberate, to make sure give him enough of a show. Something to distract him with. Bedona knew she was quite easy on the eyes, and more than a few found her extremely desirable. But she rarely used her natural look to get anything. Mostly in disguise while in her jobs her appearance was never her first weapon. This was one of the few times she was using her own skin.
The giant again didn"t even twitch. This whole time she had been keeping sharp eye on his weight on the ground, and this whole time it didn"t shift even once. He might as well had been a rock like the numerous ones around her on the beach. The biggest and the heaviest of them that breathed and had a pulse of magic flowing through him.
Dressed in her simple white blouse and dark trouser and boots she packed her bag and slung it across her shoulder. She walked toward him, alert and weary. She didn"t like it, but she wouldn"t lose herself and get into another losing fight with him this soon.
She stopped at about ten feet distance and felt crushed by the overwhelming pressure of his power. He was standing with his back to her, not seeming like he cared if she escaped. Or maybe he had some way of detecting her like she did him. She decided on latter.
She cleared her throat bit loudly, "h.e.l.lo, mister…" and let her words linger.
He turned his ma.s.sive form slowly, nearly ten feet tall in height, and about four in width and weight about a ton by what she was feeling on the sand beneath him. Dark loose robe like a priest"s, loose sleeves that came to his forearm, giving way to his ma.s.sive and hairy wrists that were wider than Bedona"s thigh. Her whole head would fit in that huge meaty hand, and looked as if it would be crushed easier than she can crush a dumpling.
"…I am Moswen." He said, so disorienting was his voice that did not meet his size nor looks. She could still not see his face clearly. Just dark eyes in the deep shadows of his brows, spotted dusky skin visible from his long mess of hair and thick dark beard that came to his upper chest left everything underneath for imagination. Then again she didn"t need it to recognize him, he was easily the biggest man she had seen, before she didn"t even know that a man could grow this big. She had heard that the red Anchor Nora was also huge, rumors only, she never seen the mysterious woman herself.
"I am …Bedona." She gave after some thought, it meant nothing to her. Changing towers she would have left the name out too. But would have made sure to send letters to her friends telling about it.
How would they know it was her otherwise when she got famous?
She had been living on that dream for a while and it was time to let it go. Years had been slowly but surely changing her and she didn"t know if she wanted to be famous anymore. Power more than fame, she thought and looked up at the large man. She was almost ready.
"This…" the man brought out the medallion, holding it in front of her face just far enough that she couldn"t s.n.a.t.c.h it away. It didn"t seem like he was aware of it himself. "How did you come by this?"
A dangerous question! To her it felt as if her life depended on the answer.
"I…" she stretched, it was about time. And she smiled at the giant, his face morphed into confusion. He opened his mouth to speak but it was too late. He fell, fell through the deep pit she had carved underneath him, tens of feet into the ground.
The medallion fell into the white sand with a dull thud and bending he picked it up. Underneath, the giant had turned limp, though try as she might she couldn"t crush him. She relented, seeing as if it didn"t matter what happened to the body anymore. And she let her quivering sense back into her, leaving her almost blind to everything but what her eyes saw. It was how normal people saw things all the time, but for her, sensing through the earth was always a part of it. So spent she was that she couldn"t let her senses spread through the ground.
She turned, her breath shaky and started away from the river. She would get a room and sleep for weeks as soon as she reached the town. But suddenly a pain like never before coursed through her. Burning and cutting, every single atom in her body. She fell down screaming and large hand exploded from under her and sieged her by her ankle. The giant rose from the sand, dirty and b.l.o.o.d.y. She felt her bones crushed under his grip but felt nothing. Her body already numb from the pain. He lifted her in front of him by her crushed ankle so that their face was in front of each other. The giant leaned forward, his nose about touching her upside down face like he was about to kiss her and just then her mind gave out as white light enveloped her.